Pariah
by Twin-Lupus
Summary: He and his brother Wes are forced to join the army to fight in a pointless war. But in a terrible battle, his brother is killed and his body is ruined. A mage named Maka makes a terrible decision, one that changes the course of his life forever. They both must deal with the consequences of her actions, and must both ask themselves: what defines who I really am?
1. Chapter 1

**An enormous thanks to makapedia, chaoticlivi, and rebornfromash for betaing this for me. I cannot thank them enough. This is a fic that was born of hard times, but under pressure, diamonds are formed, and I hope you enjoy it. Please read and review. Submitted for Resbang 2016.**

* * *

 **CHAPTER 1**

Wes sat down next to his brother with a heavy thud. The elder brother handed him a small metal bowl full of something steaming and brown, and he began to wolf it down before he could really think about what he was eating.

"Always stuffing your face there, Eater?" asked Harvar as he sat down across from him, wearing an inscrutable look.

He rolled his eyes over the top of the bowl, but didn't answer. Ox sat down on his other side, carrying his own dinner and a bottle of whiskey for the group. Kilik reached for the bottle with a nod, and Ox passed it to him.

In another world, another lifetime, the brothers would not have known the men around them. He and Wes were the sons of a nobleman, destined for diplomacy and travel. Kilik had been a blacksmith's apprentice, arms thick with the knowledge of many hammers. Ox was a scholar at the university in the capital, and his frame had the look of a man who had lost a lot of weight in a short amount of time. He didn't know what Harvar had done to occupy his time before the war, but something about the faraway look his eyes took on every once in a while had prevented him from ever asking.

Before the war. It seemed like ages ago and seven leagues away; the petty squabbles of the kings around them had faded to a dull buzzing, like the horseflies that plagued the soldiers in the fields. The war had claimed countless lives and hundreds of acres, hills of carcasses dotting the landscape, a swath of corpses stretching in the wake of the armies' waves. All efforts of the country had turned to the way, all able-bodied peoples recruited. The villages they passed through were haunted only by the thin, wraithlike bodies of those afflicted with illness or injury. The soldiers would swoop down on a village like an eagle and carry off anything they could: horses, carts, spare tools, and every scrap of food. The war was like an open wound on the country, bleeding it of all its resources.

He used his grimy finger to scrape the edges of the bowl, looking for the last drop. Kilik hit his shoulder with the bottle of whiskey, and he paused to take a swig.

"Save some for me," teased Wes.

He snorted into the bottle and took another gulp out of spite, then passed it to his brother. Wes's smile was shadowed by the dark circles under his eyes and the deep hollows of his cheeks.

Ox chewed thoughtfully, though there was no need; the stew was devoid of any meat. "I just don't understand," he said, and Harvar groaned. "No, I truly don't." Ox sounded peevish. "If the country is in such dire need of mages, why would they have a test that prevented some from joining the army as such?"

"Ox, just accept that your magic wasn't powerful enough," said Kilik with a clipped tone. He too had not been accepted as a mage for the army.

It was well known that being a mage granted far more protection than being a foot soldier in the king's army: the mages were often on the back lines, casting spells and performing enchantments from behind rows and rows of those with no magical aptitude. Those adept with healing magic were most coveted, and protected even further; they did not even see the battlefield until the corpses began to smell. Wes had been tested for magical ability when he and his brother were first forced to enlist, but despite having had enough magic to Charm every person in the village into his bed, it apparently wasn't enough to spare him from the front lines. He had had none at all, and wondered sometimes if Wes had dampened his own abilities to go with him into the army, though he always dismissed these thoughts. Wes had never hidden his talent at music when it was clear he was incapable of matching his talent; why should he do so now?

"Weapons check," came a delicate voice near his ear.

Despite a few wolf whistles directed her way, the weapons expert Tsubaki stood tall and proud behind him, hands clasped gently in front of her. Though Wes and Ox ogled her slightly, all the men around their campfire handed over their weapons without complaint. Her gentle demeanor hid an expert eye and extraordinary skill with weapons of all kinds. Even Kilik, who had forged his fair share of swords, admitted this. She held each blade and weapon aloft, eyes searching for the smallest imperfection, and applying oil and whetstone as needed. She lingered over Wes's knife, as always - it had been their great-grandfather's, and it was a work of art, delicate etchings carved into the blade and precious stones affixed to the handle - but like always, she passed it back without a word of praise.

"You are too forceful with your swings," she admonished Kilik, her slightly accented voice carrying over the calls of the men behind her. "Be careful to not hit a shield too hard; I will no longer be able to fix it. And you," she said, addressing him. "You must be careful. Your blade bears all the hallmarks of a man too willing to step in front of a sword."

He nodded, quailing slightly under her steady gaze. But without elaborating, she moved on to the next fire, a gentle "Weapons check" floating through the air back to them. Some of the men made a proposition to her, but none dared lay a hand on her; there was a multitude of blades hidden within her garments, and she had already proven she would not hesitate to remove a finger if the owner had offended.

"Would that there be more pretty faces like hers down amongst the rabble," said Wes, leaning back and putting his feet closer to the guttering flames.

The younger brother looked around. There might have been pretty faces had it not been for the near constant starvation and exhaustion that plagued the soldiers. There were women who fought as well, but everyone was almost indistinguishable, faces dirty and gaunt, hair stringy and limp. A cough had recently ravaged their numbers, and left the surviving soldiers weak and shivering. As they marched across the countryside, they often had to leave the sick on the side of the road, coughing up blood and stripped of their shoes and weapons.

It was a slow march towards death, and he took another swig.

After an hour or so, Wes, arms crossed behind his head, began to sing one of the songs their mother had never approved of, a song about a man missing his beloved and looking forward to what activities they'd get into when he returned. It was one that the other soldiers knew well, and soon the voices around their fire chimed in, and those at the neighboring fires rose to join them, and soon the song drifted throughout the entire camp, resonating among the many tents.

 _Well I had a girl and she had me_

 _And we lived together in our merry way_

 _But when I had to leave she cried me to sleep_

 _And sent me along with naught but to pray_

 _But as I did sleep she came to me_

 _As a dream down the river of wine_

 _She carries two bowls of sweet milk and h'ney_

 _And her hair is held up by gold twine_

 _And she brings me berries all stained on her lips_

 _And a pie baked golden and brown_

 _And my bonny wee baby she bears on her hips_

 _And on my head she does place her wide crown_

The bottle made its way around the fire, and then another appeared, its contents sloshing as it was passed from hand to hand, soldier to soldier, men and women who knew their lives could end tomorrow, who chose to drink and sing by the dying embers and pretend that there might be more ahead.

* * *

Many of their lives did end the next day.

Before dawn, there was a scream at the edge of the camp, and a trumpet call soon after, rousing the soldiers, high pitched and urgent. His eyes shot open, and any lingering alcohol in his system was washed away by the flood of adrenaline pounding through his veins, blood loud in his ears. He grabbed the weathered scythe they had seized from a farmer many weeks ago and sprang from his bedroll. The camp was in chaos: soldiers ran between the tents in various states of undress, some clad in armor, some wearing only cloth. Kilik was nowhere to be seen. Ox and Harvar were standing back to back, already ready for battle.

He was about to shout for his brother, but the words died in his throat as Wes appeared from one of the tents. His blue eyes matched the sky above, laser focused on his younger brother as he drew his cloak around him. "Stay with me!" he shouted, drawing his sword.

The enemy had struck without warning; there were no battle lines, only a seething mass of warriors undulating like waves. He followed his brother, eyes darting left and right. It was almost impossible to distinguish friend from foe. Both armies had barely any standardized flags or armor left; most soldiers on both sides wore haphazard collections.

Ox and Harvar disappeared into the crowd. The elder slashed at a man's back, and the younger drove his scythe into him as he fell. The tip of his blade stuck a bit in the blond man's ribcage, and he struggled to release it as Wes leaned over and relieved the corpse of the shield it no longer needed. "In formation!" cried Wes, and he fell into step with him, ducking behind the shield to avoid blows dealt by oncoming soldiers and whipping his scythe out behind Wes's back into their sides.

He had to blink the perspiration out of his eyes several times; the early morning sun was rising hot and high in the sky. He could see rivulets of sweat drip down Wes's neck and stain his shirt.

A woman with long, scraggly hair and blackened teeth attacked Wes and managed to drive her knife into his sword arm. He yelled in agony while his brother tried to drive the blade of his scythe into her skull, but she was nimble. She charged forward, too close for the range of the rusty scythe, but Wes gave a grunt and drove his knife into her inner thigh as she passed him. A banshee scream tore from her lips as she collapsed, the ground below her stained red.

"Wes!" he bellowed over the sounds of the battle.

Kneeling, he tried to examine the wound. Wes was left-handed, so he bore his sword in his dominant hand and guarded with the other. The knife was not deep, and he pulled it out and handed it to him. "Keep on!"

Their bloody duet raged on. He felt his swings grow slower and less accurate with every blow, and the pilfered shield that protected his back hung heavily against his neck. Wes's blows were quicker now that he had just the knife, but his arm was bleeding freely. Around them, men and women shrieked and cried, attacked and collapsed. The air was thick with the scent of blood and viscera, and his boots were soaked through with it. He concentrated solely on moving forward, following Wes's lead: the battle appeared before him only in flashes. A man wearing the enemy's colors begging for mercy, one leg missing. A woman wearing a familiar shield face down in the dirt, her skin as pale white as the bones poking through her arm. A young teenager of indiscernible alignment with a pretty face save for the half that had been caved in. He tried to swallow the bile in his throat and focus on Wes, on surviving, on swinging his scythe.

A sound, unmistakable in its foreignness.

Someone was laughing. Amidst the groans and gurgles and screams, a rumbling laugh made its way to his ears. He pivoted, distracted, and a tall man stood in front of him. Long black hair hung into the man's face, almost obscuring an x-shaped scar across the bridge of his nose. His grin was wild, teeth crimson with blood.

The man raised his sword over his head, glinting in the sun. He could only stare dumbfounded.

"Watch out!"

In an instant, Wes was in front of him, shield clanging in the morning air with the sound of the blade bouncing off of it, ringing like a church bell. The man gave a sharp, harsh laugh that was more like a yelp, then brought his blade down again. Wes parried each blow with the shield, grunting with exertion. He raised his scythe, looking for an opening.

But the man was relentless, and despite his wheezing, his laughter continued. He drove his body between the brothers, chortling with maniacal glee. Wes tried to step out of the deadly rhythm, tried to gain an upper hand, tried to use his knife, but nothing seemed to be working. The man seemed to have an unlimited font of bloodthirsty cheer.

Wes clearly must have been tiring, because he did not deflect the blade well that time, and the man took the opportunity to backhand it at him again, and it cut straight across his throat.

"WES!" shrieked the younger brother. The red smile across Wes's throat grinned and gurgled, staining his front. Wes fell to his knees. The man laughed hysterically until he whipped his scythe blade through the man's neck and his head fell to the ground, his lips still stretched wide in a triumphant grin. He bolted forward, throwing his scythe to the side.

A child stepped in front of him.

For a brief moment, He was shocked that a child so young could fight in the army, their skin dirty and pale, their hair a filthy blonde, glowing pink in the rising sun. But then the child soldier, eyes dull, raised a black blade, and the young man, who had thrown away his only weapon, could do nothing but take the blow.

* * *

The sky was as blue as Wes's eyes.

He stared into it, blood bubbling at the corners of his mouth. He wanted to shout, to scream at the heavens above, to beg for some sort of release or vengeance or hellfire, but his chest was ruined, lungs exposed to the air and filling rapidly with blood. Turning his head allowed him to see his brother's body next to him, painted scarlet but otherwise untouched, the yin to his yang, curling towards his brother as his life drained from his body. He could smell blood, his own blood, iron heavy on his tongue, and he knew his chest gaped open, like a mouth in surprise, a silent scream to the beautiful blue sky above. A matching demonic grin to the smaller one across Wes's throat.

He would die here.

He tried to stretch his fingers to reach his brother's hand even as a darkness gathered around the edges of his vision. The smell of carrion was strong in the air. Around him, the sounds of the battle had receded, most of the soldiers lying broken on the ground. There was birdsong.

He couldn't reach, fingers scrabbling uselessly in the moist dirt.

As the world grew black around him, something moved in the corner of his eye. He thought he saw a flash of straw against the azure, and felt the tiniest of feather touches on his cheek, surely the last thing he would ever feel.

* * *

Everything felt like it was burning, a mess of red and licking blue flames.

Then it was black.

He was drifting under an endless wave, dark sludge slowly coursing over his fingers, threading into his hair, getting into his nostrils. He floated aimlessly in this cold womb, the thing that might transport him away from the living. The opposite of birth. His death.

Were it not for the bit of light hovering at the edges of his vision.

It was like a small nagging voice in his ear, an uncomfortable itch he couldn't scratch, wings fluttering that he couldn't swat away. Persistent. His chest burned.

 _Stay with me_ , commanded a voice, but why? What was the point?

Let me sleep, he wanted to say. Let me go.

Everything was black, until it wasn't.


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER 2**

The first thing he noticed was the smell.

His olfactory senses overloaded with the scent of the dying. The putrid smell of pus hung in the air, and a dull iron taste covered his mouth. His throat was dry, so dry, and his skin felt like it was on fire.

He coughed, retching with nothing to come up, and a hand was at his throat. His throat _burned_. The spittle was wiped from his cheeks and water, warm stale water but water nonetheless, was poured between his unyielding lips. He spluttered.

A voice cursed above him, but he felt those hands move to his chest and pound ruthlessly. He coughed, coughed again, then felt his strength leave him, and slipped beneath the waves once again.

* * *

The stench of a salve near his nostrils, something like the earth, overwhelmed him when he next gained consciousness. He wanted to scratch at the thick goop stretched beneath his chin, but his arms felt like lead.

He shivered under several blankets and coughed again. His throat hurt so much, how was this possible-

A cool cloth was placed on his forehead, and the relief was so instantaneous, he slept again.

* * *

He was screaming.

There was a demon in his chest, desperate to get out. The claws were embedded in his organs, scratching at the door to his chest that wouldn't open.

The hands were back, everywhere at once, clutching him desperately. His voice crackled and rasped; it sounded like he was screaming through shards of glass. Why was it so hot? He thrashed, desperate to rid himself of the blankets.

For a moment, his eyes shot open, and he saw the ragged top of a dirty tent, a single hole in the middle for the release of smoke from the medicinal fire, and against the sun shining through it, the head of the person grasping his chest was illuminated, the pale hair a halo-

His eyes slammed shut, trying to keep the demon inside so it would not tear him apart. Every part of his being seemed to want to fly into the air in every direction, every piece of him as far away as it possibly could, _wrong wrong wrong wrong this is wrong wrong should not be-_

But the hands on his chest grew suddenly ice cold, and he was gone once more.

* * *

The tent still smelled badly, but through the acrid scents of the dead, he could smell cooking mutton.

He inhaled slowly, slowly, through his nose. His throat still ached more than it ever had in his life, but for the moment, he could breathe again. The air was warm in his lungs; he was under the blankets again, tucked in more tightly than before.

His tongue swiped across his lips. Dry, dry, cracked and dry. A small groan escaped him, and the hands were back, somehow both stern and comforting.

"Drink," came a voice, and he tried to oblige, prying his husk of a mouth open. His tongue felt almost furry. A trickle of water flowed into his mouth, and he slowly sipped at the nectar of life. His throat still felt terrible, but it seemed that he could swallow in small increments, and he lapped at the water for what felt like an hour.

Even that small bit of exertion pushed him to exhaustion, and he fell asleep again. This time, however, it was far more restful, and he woke in the middle of the night, the stars illuminated in the small open hole of the tent ceiling.

He watched them through slitted eyes, crust keeping them nearly shut, trying to recognize any of the constellations he saw turn unyielding overhead. He knew they formed dazzling shapes, stretched across the horizon, but from his limited vantage point, he could only imagine them.

* * *

He wasn't aware of falling asleep, but he was cognizant of waking up to a kettle.

Keeping his eyes closed, he realized it was voices, not steam, he was hearing. He couldn't make out the words, but they sounded tense.

He tried to move to sit up and see, but his limbs seemed to be moving through molasses. He let out a groan, and the hands were back, pressing against his bare shoulders and easing him back down.

"Lie down," said the voice, terse and… nervous?

He let out a breath through his nostrils, and lay still.

* * *

Finally he awoke to find her sitting on his bed, studying his face.

She looked young, though her general appearance was belied by the weariness in her face. The hollows of her cheeks were pronounced, and her freckles appeared faded, as if she had previously spent a lot of time outside and now had been trapped indoors for some time. The dark circles under her eyes and her pale skin only added to the vision.

Her hair had appeared an angelic golden before, though now it just looked dirty and unkempt, tied into twin tails at the side of her head. He could see that her eyes were green as she stared into his face for the split second they made eye contact until she realized he was awake and jumped up.

"You need to eat," she said, and walked out of his line of sight to bustle about at the other end of the tent. His throat was still sore, and he couldn't form any words, so he stared at the tent ceiling in helpless silence.

The roar of the fire grew more pronounced and he felt the temperature rise in the tent, and she reappeared after a few more minutes, a bowl of some sort of stew in her hands.

"I've been getting broth into you, but I think you need more substance," she said, all business. "Open up."

He managed to crack open his mouth, and her eyes were suddenly riveted to it. He could only imagine how horrid his breath was. She carefully ladled food into his mouth, avoiding his teeth, which felt almost too big for him at this point - he must be emaciated - and he eased the warm chunks of root vegetables down his throat. She occasionally dabbed at his mouth with a small cloth to clean him, something that embarrassed him greatly, but she treated it like she had done it many times. Which, he supposed, she probably had. How long had he been like this?

She seemed unable to tear her eyes away from his mouth. When the sound of the spoon scraping the bottom of the bowl cut through the quiet of the tent, she turned away, looking at the fire. Her profile was illuminated by the crackling flames. "You should rest," she said. "I'll see how you're doing in a few hours, and if you keep the food down, I'll get more." There was something in her voice that was hesitant, slightly strangled, but the food was sitting heavily in his gut, and he slumbered once more.

* * *

He must have overslept, because the tent was dark again when he woke up next. Throat still protesting terribly, he was hungry again, which he took to be a good sign. His limbs felt less gangly and uncoordinated, and he managed to heft himself upright a bit before the young woman walked back into the tent.

She looked a little startled to see him up. Her chest expanded as if her breath caught in her throat, but she stomped over to him without hesitation. "You should be resting!" she scolded.

He tried to open his mouth, but it only came out in a cough.

As if she read his mind, she put a hand on his shoulder and tried to ease him back down. "I know it's been a long time you've been stuck here, but you're still extremely weak. Please just lie down."

Letting out a sigh, he obliged, unwilling to admit that even that small movement had tired him out again.

She perched again at the side of his bed, looking like a bird about to take flight at the slightest provocation. He stared up at her, unable to say anything. A trembling hand rose from her side to reach out and rest its fingertips against his forehead. The points of contact felt like lightning, hot and crackling with power.

"I'm a mage," she explained quietly. "I've been working hard to keep you alive."

Laboriously, he lifted a hand and held hers to his forehead. He could see her neck contort as she swallowed thickly. Even if he could not speak, he had to ask.

"Yes, you had a fever," she said, seeming to choose her words carefully. He shook his head below her fingertips. She bit her lip, and his eyes focused on the movement, noting the cracked edges of her lips, worn down as if she had picked up the habit recently. In a gesture more forward than he had ever made before, he curled his fingers around hers. Dragged her hand to his lips. Pressed a light kiss to her peeling skin.

She winced as if she had been branded. He tried not to flinch, but something must have shot across his face because she licked her lips and gave him a wan smile. "Oh," she said, finally understanding. "Yes. My name is Maka."

* * *

Maka was a volatile mixture of diligent and impatient. She worked hard to help him regain his strength, but she seemed frustrated when he didn't make good progress, or when he seemed reluctant to heed her advice about not moving too much. His body recovered, a bit at a time, though his throat seemed to take the longest to heal. Maka applied the foul-smelling salve often, something that made him crinkle his nose in disgust. Once when she pulled out the mortar and pestle to begin the process of making it, he let out a high-pitched whine of complaint, and she snapped, "If you don't shut up, I'll give you something to really groan about!" He had frozen, staring up at her; she took a deep breath, seemed to count to herself, then busied herself with the work of creating the poultice. He had suffered silently from then on.

Though he couldn't reply, she seemed to like to talk to him. She didn't tell him much about her past, he noticed immediately - but she talked about things a mage should know, and what her powers were capable of, and how she tried to use them for the army. He also observed that she seemed not to want to use too much magic around him - or perhaps that she couldn't. At times, her fingertips would flare with the cold energy he had felt before, often when she was mixing his salve or cooking dinner, but she seemed exhausted afterwards.

"Used too much," he heard her say once, when she thought he was asleep, muttering and staring at her hands. "Too much."

But the long hours spent sleeping and eating warm meals and drinking cool water seemed to do exactly what he needed it to do, and he felt his strength returning. Maka seemed pleased at his progress when he was able to sit up and feed himself, and the smile she flashed him was more dazzling than he would expect from such a thin, tired young woman.

* * *

The hole in the tent ceiling revealed it to be nighttime, wispy clouds drifting overhead. At first he couldn't tell what had awoken him, but soon a sound reached his ears: a ragged, low breathing.

He focused, and was finally able to discern what he was hearing. It was the hiccupy soft gasps of someone sobbing.

With a lot of effort, still shaking off the effects of sleep, he dragged himself to his elbows. Maka was bent over in the small chair by the end of his bed, crying quietly into her hands. The fire had burned low, embers now, casting her into strange relief; she looked almost like a painting that might be hanging on the walls of his father's manor.

He shifted forward again, trying to get a better look. No one seemed to be in the tent. They were alone.

He opened his mouth, but only a ragged hiss came out, too quiet for her to hear. He swallowed, his mouth feeling strangely full. "M…Ma-ka."

Her head snapped up, tear-streaked face glowing in the soft light of the flames. "Oh!" she gasped, using the tattered sleeve of her dress to rub at her glistening cheeks. "I'm so-"

"Maka."

She stood up and hurried to him, sitting on the edge of the bed. Peering into his face, she asked in a strangled voice, "Is everything okay?"

He lifted a hand to her cheek and pressed it against her skin. It was warm to the touch, flushed with crying. She shuddered. Another tear trickled out the corner of her eye, and he brushed it away with his thumb. He was still sleepy, but he concentrated on her blotchy face. He nodded down at her once.

She understood. Biting her lip again, she seemed to contemplate something for a moment, and then her face crumpled, and she launched herself forward. She buried her face in his shoulder and began to sob in earnest again.

He slowly lowered his arms to encircle her waist, barely touching her. Her breath against his skin was overloading his senses, and this strange woman, a paradox of delicate and strong, had her arms wrapped around his neck and her head resting against his collarbone.

His world had been narrowed to a pinpoint, existing only within this tent and this bed and this space, and she was his sun, circling overhead, and he kept time by her, watched her, worshipped her, had to shield himself when she burned too brightly. He could yet not name the feelings she ignited in him, but in that moment, he felt that there was no place he'd rather be. He was content to hold her until she cried herself out, until she exorcised any demons that might be plaguing her.

* * *

Maka, as it turned out, was not a great cook.

Now that he was far more awake and aware of what was going on, he found that the food she was serving him wasn't all that palatable. It might have kept him alive, but that didn't make it particularly tasty.

"Maka," he groaned as she handed him a lumpy bowl of oats and nuts. "Eggs. Please."

"There aren't a lot of chickens to go around," she replied, sitting down next to his bed and spooning her own slightly burnt meal into her mouth. "You've been so ill, and I feared having you too close to the rest of the camp, so we're on the very edge of it. It takes too long to go get eggs in the morning; the chickens are kept far closer to the soldiers."

He let out a sad sigh, but obediently began to eat. His throat was still sore, so he was very cautious with his meals, but he was starting to feel better.

He was starting to feel like himself again.

"I believe if you're feeling well enough to complain, you're feeling well enough to do some of the chores I asked of you," she said. Maka tilted her head to gaze up at him from her low stool. "I could really use those reeds cut and sorted for more spells. I don't think I have any spells that might speed the healing of your throat, but-"

Something _plapped_ against the wall of the tent. Maka turned to look as another sound, _plap_ , rang out. _Plap plap plap._ She stood, upending her bowl, and ran outside, the blast of sunlight straining his eyes, so unaccustomed to the harsh glare after so many weeks in the tent. There were shouts, far away and indistinguishable, but Maka yelled back, high-pitched and angry. Another _plap_ , and he could smell the sulfur that meant Maka was creating a ball of fire in her palm. After another few minutes, she returned to the tent, her hair standing slightly on end and the dark circles under her eyes more pronounced.

"Who?"

"Sorry?"

"Maka. Who was… that?"

Her face was carefully neutral. "No one of importance. Children being foolish. They... threw some eggs at the tent and I told them not to waste the resource." She set about cleaning up her spilled food, making a big show of it. Standing with a slight grunt, she pierced him with a gaze from under her eyelashes. "And I'll thank you," Maka murmured, voice strange and almost eerie, "not to speak to the universe like that in the future."

* * *

After the incident, Maka kept him busy. She always seemed to be able to produce some small task that took hours, like sorting a bag of buttons by shade of bone or weaving small spells with extra strands of yarn and thread. He was no mage, so they held no power until Maka imbued them with the necessary energy, but the crafting of them could be done by even his inexperienced hand. "Don't worry if they're messy," she'd say when he'd hand them over, chagrined. "The spells still work even if the vessel isn't perfect. It's the intention that counts."

Once or twice he tried to get out of bed, but she quickly shoved him back down. "I don't think you're ready yet," she would say each time. No matter what excuse he tried to give, she wouldn't hear any of it.

"Could get more water," he rasped. "Running low."

"I'll get it."

But a sense of restlessness had settled over him, and at night the _plaps_ of the eggs that had been thrown against the tent beat against his brain, over and over. The stars through the hole in the tent gave him no answers, and an unease, an itchiness, simmered under the surface.

Maka once returned from getting more supplies and had nearly dropped them all over the floor of the tent when she found him standing and preparing a meal.

"Your cooking is awful," he said with a smug grin, but the wavering smile she offered in return didn't reach her eyes.

He asked her once, now that he was feeling better, if they should move closer to the camp, but she had frozen, like a doe in the sights of the hunter, and explained in a shaky voice that she was still concerned about his health and she didn't want to push him.

He heard voices in the middle of the night once again, indiscernible but angry, and in the morning, Maka's devastated gasp escaped her lips before she could rush out of the tent. He sat up quickly. The sun against the tent caused it to light up so that he could see red painted letters dripping down cloth walls. They appeared backwards to him, but he could still read the word: 'WITCH.'

* * *

The morning dawned cold and clear.

He was feeling stronger, more capable of staying out of bed for longer periods of time. He was trying to be helpful, taking the old wooden bucket of water out of the tent so Maka wouldn't have to when she returned. For a moment, the sun seemed almost blistering on his skin, and he hunched over, waiting for sickness to pass. He leaned over the bucket and gazed down into the water to allow for the nausea to subside.

Now that the water was no longer in the darkness of the tent, its surface was glassy, reflective. He could see his face.

Something was wrong.

The bridge of his nose was too long, his eyes were too far apart, his hair was-

He stumbled backwards, his back hitting the side of the tent. The poles holding the cloth snapped, and it came tumbling down on top of him, entangling him and trapping him within the folds. It was as if he were drowning in the fabric, underwater again-

The hands reached for him again, freeing him and dragging him back into the light. He stumbled, breathing heavily.

"What's going on-?"

He whirled on her. Hands clenching around her shoulders, he stared into her eyes. He was close, so close, and he could see his own reflection in them, and it was just as wrong as it had been before.

"What did you do to me?" he asked, ragged and harsh. "What- _who_ \- am I?"

Staring back up at him from the bottom of her irises was the face of his brother.


	3. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER 3**

Maka resurrected the tent with a bit of her magic. There was a tear down the front of the tent, which she had sewn back together, but it would never be the same, it would always be a scar across the cloth - like the scar across his chest.

And his _other_ chest.

She sat on her well worn stool, twisting a cloth in her lap over and over again. She had never looked younger than she did right now. Sitting with hunched shoulders and a resigned look on her face and her hair in those twin tails, Maka looked like a child.

"I… I don't know where to start," she said.

He clenched his fists, fists that were not his. "The battle."

"It did not go well."

Something sarcastic bubbled to his tongue, but he held back; she looked so browbeaten. But the acid in his stomach still roiled, so he did say, "Okay, but what _happened_?"

She glanced up at him. Took a deep shuddering breath. Began.

"My powers… were strong enough to keep me well protected throughout this war," she said, almost as if she had rehearsed what she was going to say. "But what made me most valuable, most prized, was my ability to see the souls of others. This power gave me the ability to seek out those who sought to do us harm. I participated in a number of spying missions in which we tried to count the number of enemy soldiers approaching. I didn't need to be able to actually see them; I could sense their souls."

He licked his lips, feeling antsy, but he didn't want to interrupt. Leaning forward, he clasped his hands in front of him, a gesture that might have looked contemplative but in fact provided him an anchor, something to keep him from crawling out of his own skin.

 _His own?_

"But eventually this was not deemed as important as it had been - both armies had been so decimated, that it hardly seemed to matter - and I was sent here, to this battalion. I became a healer."

"I never met you."

"You wouldn't have if you never had been hurt badly. I focused on the seriously injured soldiers. I was particularly good at it, because I was able to see the souls out on the battlefield. I could find people who were still alive out there."

He swallowed. It ached.

"And I found you."

Her eyes bore into him, and now he was the one kowtowed, the one looking away. Maka had a way of looking through people, and with a sinking sensation, he realized she did - she could see his soul. She could see through him, see past his defenses. He felt naked.

"You found… me."

"Yes," she said, taking a deep breath in through her nose. "And… your brother."

His world tilted slightly, spinning off kilter.

"I mean, I figured he had to be your brother. You both had the same pale blond hair, the same hazel eyes, the same cheekbones… but he was dead and you were alive."

A sharp intake of breath. He hadn't even realized he'd done it, but she paused, looking concerned. He shook his head, silently urging her to continue. Maka looked as if she wanted to reach out to him, to take his hand, but something in the way he was clenching his jaw seemed to tell her not to, and she tucked her hands below her thighs and spoke again. It was with a precision, with a sense of removal, from the perspective of a disinterested party.

"Your brother's throat was slashed, and his soul was gone - he was clearly dead. But you were still alive, somehow, even though your chest had been almost- almost torn in two. You were dying, but you weren't dead yet, but there was no way I could save you… at least, your body."

"Why not?"

Maka looked a little startled, as if she hadn't been expecting that question. "Well, my magic… healing magic doesn't just… just _happen_. I have to know what I'm doing; I have to purposefully sew together all sinew and bone, all your blood vessels… and I… I didn't know what was wrong. It was broken in so many places, it was just… just ruined."

His hand subconsciously drifted to his chest.

"But your brother's body was almost perfect."

Something turned over in his stomach.

"I just- I just- I made a decision. I looked at you, choking on your own blood, fighting so hard to _live_ , and your brother's body was just right there, and you were so similar I thought… I thought maybe his body would accept your soul." Her breathing was a bit more ragged now. "I didn't- I couldn't ask for permission, so I just… I did it." She swallowed. "I just… I didn't want to watch someone suffer. I could help, so I did."

"You- you took my _soul_ from my body and put it in my brother's?"

Maka bit her lip, but did not look away.

He felt sick to his stomach. Hands that were not his gripped foreign knees. Every part of him- of _him_?- felt slimy, and he had the sudden urge to claw at his skin, to rip it open and free himself-

"What happened to- to-" He gestured to his chest.

The scar that bisected his chest still ached with every breath he drew through his ruined throat.

"I don't know," Maka whispered, her voice pained. "When I grafted your soul to your brother's body, it… it carved itself down his skin. There was nothing I could do. I think… I think damage was done to your soul from the attack."

"So you touched my soul? You held it in your hands. It was in your _hands_."

They sat in silence for what felt like hours. He felt so inextricably tied to the person in front of him, this tiny woman of fire and fury, of compassion and kindness, who had saved his life and cradled his soul, and yet he felt simultaneously repulsed by her. He hadn't asked for this. _He hadn't asked for this_.

She tentatively reached out for him, and he flinched.

"I know… I know it's very complicated at the moment, and I know this is a lot to process all at once, but…" Maka trailed off, leaving her hand clasped around his. "I…"

"I think I need to lie down," he said, his voice iron, his hands clenched. Maka withdrew as if she had been scalded.

"Of course," she said, her voice too high and brittle to truly appear nonchalant. "Get some rest."

He slipped into the bed and turned his back on her.

* * *

Over the next few days, they did not speak. His voice withered away without the practice, trapped behind the inflamed wall of magic-repaired sinew and skin. Maka seemed to take his silence as punishment, and she walked around the tent subdued and somber.

He had the opportunity to examine himself when she left to get more supplies on the second day. His hands were a little longer, a little thinner. His shoulders were narrower now, but he was a bit taller than he had been.

But the true difference was the glaring _mistakes_ , the monstrous changes that had mutilated his brother's body when his soul had entered it. Wes's straw-colored hair was now a shock of white against his forehead, and his eyes had turned a bloodshot red. Running his tongue over his teeth revealed that they were now far sharper than any human's had a right to be. He was an unholy union of discarded body and unwanted spirit, haunting the home that his brother had abandoned. At night he would lie awake, trying to feel with his soul, searching for anything _within_ that revealed something of the body's former occupant, but there was nothing. It felt like wearing someone else's clothes; nothing fit precisely, it had stretched in some places and not in others. But in this case, he was wearing his dead brother's face, and he was masquerading as a human.

But he wasn't one, he wasn't one, he couldn't be one. He was a demon, a monster, he was _wrong_.

* * *

A few days later, some of the soldiers left the skull of a deer outside their tent.

He nearly tripped on his way out to relieve himself. A swarm of flies took flight with a sudden droning, spiraling into the air and away from the carcass. Swearing under his breath, he stepped around the skull, still covered in sinew and patches of fur, blood matted and brown against the bone.

"They've done that a few times," a quiet voice said from behind him. "You can just throw it into the woods."

He bent and picked up the skull. The eye sockets were empty, having already been picked over by the flies, and he stared into their depths.

"I'll keep it," he said hoarsely. Maka didn't protest as he sat heavily on the ground and took out a knife to begin to scrape away the remaining flesh.

"They think what I did was wrong," she murmured. He didn't look up; he kept attacking the bones with the knife. "They think I went against the gods, against nature."

"They think I'm a monster." The knife caught on a sliver of bone and it flew off into the grass. "This isn't a message to you, this is a message to me. What they do with monsters."

Maka's lip curled up into a snarl. "Listen," she said, her voice low and deadly. "You can choose to hate me, that's fine, and you can choose to wallow if you want, but you are _not_ a monster."

He turned to face her and used his index finger to pull his lips back, revealing his overly sharp teeth.

"No one who holds someone like that is a monster," she spat. Her words were so venomous that it took Soul until long after she had stomped into the tent to realize that she had been speaking about their tender moment.

* * *

Eating felt wrong.

It felt wrong to supply this body with nutrients when it wasn't meant to be alive. It felt wrong to taste something with a tongue that didn't belong to him. Everything felt off, different, unnatural. Everything was strange. He barely felt like he was himself these days, and he was keeping himself alive despite every law of nature demanding that he die.

Was he even alive? It was hard to tell. What did it mean to be alive, if his soul was here, and his body was rotting in an open field several miles away, ribs exposed and stomach bubbling under the piercing sun?

His cooking grew careless, barely any better than the stuff Maka had managed not to burn before, but she didn't complain. They had barely spoken since he had placed the deer skull over the entrance to their tent. He used some of the small binding spells Maka had powered to close the tent to attach it securely to the supporting beams. Flies buzzed around it, attracted to the last bits of flesh his knife had been unable to cleave from the bone, but Maka staunchly ignored it every time she passed through the tent's opening. He felt it was appropriate: a rotting corpse for the house of the rotting corpse.

Yet he could not forget what she had said. It wasn't just that she told him he wasn't a monster - that remained debatable - but about how much his touch mattered to her. About how much it revealed. About how she felt.

Even after the argument, she had not asked him to leave. He was fully healed - if such a thing was _possible_ , being an errant soul in his brother's dead body - but she hadn't kicked him out of the tent. Nor had she attempted to move it any closer to the camp. As the army moved, slowly tracking through the countryside, they remained at the very edges, close enough to see the dim lights of their campfires in the distance and the occasional drunken song, and close enough to still receive smelly parts of dead animals at their doorstep, but not close enough to cause the soldiers to drive them away. Indeed, he wondered at times whether they felt like it was better to keep them around so they could keep an eye on Maka. A mage that could see souls was rare enough, but one that could _move_ those souls was something unheard of- something dangerous.

Despite her ample abilities, however, Maka seemed content to do only small spells around their campsite. She bewitched their bedsheets to keep them warm at night, she cleaned their water, she mended the tears in their clothes. She never tried enchanting their food; it seemed a glaring oversight in her magical education, if you asked him, but perhaps it was better that she didn't accidentally poison them.

The crackling fire she could draw to her palms, he learned, could not actually keep their fire going, so one of their constant tasks was collecting enough firewood to stay warm. Their separation from the rest of the camp made it impossible to benefit from any residual heat from any of their fires, so it fell entirely to their small fire to keep them warm. The insides of their tent were blackened with soot in some parts when Maka had stoked their fire too high; she seemed perennially cold.

But the acrid smell that he awoke to one morning was definitely not from their fire. He leapt out of bed, rushing past Maka's cot to burst through the tent opening into the cool dawn air. Once before, some of the soldiers had tried to set their tent aflame, so he had torn his shirt off as he ran, ready to tamp down the embers. A quick glance of the canvas told him that there was nothing amiss there. He turned, and saw a patch of grass in front of their tent smoldering, smoke curling into the air, a strange contrast to the dewy blades outside the range of the spell. The words "NO WITCHES AMONG MAGES" glittered and flickered as the sun rose above the trees.

"What's happen-?"

Maka appeared behind him, fully dressed and her hands sparking with her own energies. Her eyes seemed to lock onto his chest, then she turned, face flushed. He knew his scar troubled her: it was a reminder of her spell that bound his soul to his brother's body, a malediction on her attempt to save his life.

"What does this mean?" he demanded, remaining defiantly barechested.

"What does what mean?"

"'No witches among mages.' What's the difference? I thought 'witch' was just what peasants called mages when they feared them."

Maka frowned. "Well, I think they likely did, but they have a lot of right to fear mages. Historically, mages have been used to strip them of their land and resources."

He rolled his eyes. "Maka. No history lessons."

She breathed in through her nose, as if trying to calm herself. "Fine," she said, rage simmering under the surface. "Either way, there _are_ people that mages would consider to be witches. Mages agree to study under the tutelage of other mages; mages obey the edicts set down by the kingdom. A witch could be anyone who doesn't follow those rules, or someone who insists on… on making their own spells."

"So like what you did to me?"

Maka bit her lip. She had still been worrying them, so they were red and puffy. He watched her from his too-tall height; he still wasn't used to towering over people to whom he would have previously been close in height.

"Not… not quite."

"What does that mean?"

"I didn't make up the spell to put your soul in your brother's body." She let out the air in her lungs in a low breath, one that misted and then dissipated into the air. "Someone else invented it."

He stepped closer to her. Maka seemed a little taken aback, but stood her ground.

"Who?"

"A mage who… experimented. Often. With human souls. He always said it was for the greater good, to try to help people… but he became a pariah when the village discovered what he was _really_ doing. I was young, and I didn't understand why everyone was so angry… but he had a _body_ in there…"

Her eyes were full of tears at this point. Something moved within him, and the urge to wrap his arms around her rose up from the depths of his confusion. He quelched it.

"He left in the middle of the night. Said he was going to have to leave, and he wouldn't see me again for a very long time. But he gave me… he gave me his book of spells. We had only just learned about my ability to see souls, and he had wanted to teach me, but my father was so angry… so he said it was a gift. One I c-couldn't show anyone."

The tears were thick and fast now, and he felt a wave of guilt crash over him. But he also had to know, _had to know-_

"Who was he?"

Maka hiccuped, swallowed, tried to steady herself. "My godfather. A man named Stein."


	4. Chapter 4

**CHAPTER 4**

Another battle occurred the next day. The field was strewn with the bodies of fallen soldiers, some twisted and torn open, some still breathing but left for dead.

Maka was anxious all day, hovering around the tent's edge, peering off into the distance. He knew she wanted to go and help, but she had been forbidden by the generals to approach the wounded. They didn't want a repeat of _him_.

"You need to eat," he said gruffly, shoving a bowl of food into her hands. Maka glanced down at it in surprise. With a bit of trepidation, she brought the spoon to her mouth. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise.

He grunted. He had taken more care with the food that day, and it actually tasted good. Or, at least, as good as it could with a tiny ration of ingredients, most of which needed to be used sparingly in case Maka needed to craft another spell. Still, the difference was palpable, and Maka shoveled the food into her mouth.

Chewing thoughtfully on the last bite, she turned to face him. "Were you a chef? Before the war?"

With a snort, he shook his head. He sat down, a little ungainly on too-long legs, and faced the edges of the army's encampment. "No. I was a pampered son of a nobleman of little real importance."

"What was your surname?"

He looked at her through his eyelashes. Her expression was unreadable, but she was scraping the bowl with the spoon a little too carefully.

"Evans."

"And… and your first?" Red eyes met green, and after a moment, she turned away, face red and a mumble of, "Worth a shot," on her breath.

Maka had tried not to stress his throat when he had first woken up, and therefore hadn't asked him his name. By the time he had discovered the horrific nature of his new life, she still hadn't. Since then, he had refused to give it.

Because what did it matter? Could it even be applied to him anymore? He was a unholy amalgam of his brother and himself, something against nature, against reason, against the gods. Shedding his previous name felt appropriate; he certainly wasn't himself.

He wondered, in his darkest moments, if he should refer to himself as 'Wes,' but the thought made him sick. His brother's stomach churned in protest when those thoughts would surface. What if he had woken up and known immediately that he was in his brother's body? Would he have wanted to assume his identity?

Growing up, there was nothing he wanted more than to be like his older brother. Charismatic, confident, talented, beloved: Wes was everything he was not, and even some of the things he was, but better, shinier, softer. Those feelings of inadequacy had been squashed during the long hard months of the war, when they were both tired and dirty and hungry, but now that he had had a chance to rest, they reared again, stronger and fiercer than ever.

And whenever Maka eyed him, thinking herself surreptitious, he felt those feelings turn over a hundred fold. He _knew_ Wes was an attractive man; even without his Charm abilities, he would have been able to bed half the town. He could feel Maka's gaze as he pulled his shirt over his head, revealing Wes's lithe frame, could feel her touch lingering as they passed each other spell pieces back and forth, could hear the way her voice stretched thin with longing when the nights were cold and lonely in their little tent.

He knew she had not saved his life for any selfish reason. She had seen an opportunity to preserve someone's soul, and she had done so; the body she had to work with was incidental. He knew this. But he also knew she was living like a married woman with his brother's body, and that was bound to have an effect. To know Wes was to find him attractive. To know _him_ was to find him invisible. The attention was disconcerting.

But not entirely unwelcome.

Despite everything, despite it being she who had transformed him into the monster that he was, he could not help but feel drawn to her. She had held is very soul in her hands. Whatever it looked like, whatever she could feel or see or sense about him, she had cradled his very essence in her hands and deemed it worthy of living. Her determination, her pigheadedness, her passion, her intelligence: they permeated the small cloth tent they called home. He saw her leave small Charms as they moved their tent, blessings that would heal the earth behind them and make the land arable again when farmers finally took it back. He saw her roll up her sleeves and press the salve to his wounds without a word of complaint, despite the drain of her magic keeping him alive required. He saw her tie her hair back as she pored over spellbooks, improving her mind even as she lived in isolation and squalor, with a monster hiding in the shadows.

Did she want him? Or _him_?

* * *

Finally, several weeks later, one of the other mages assigned to their battalion summoned Maka to the main healing tents. It was clear he was viscerally disgusted by looking at the both of them, his young lean face a quaking mess from trying not to curl into a sneer, but Maka pretended not to notice. She threw a number of her herbs and spell bindings into a large basket and began to quickly rifle through some of her books.

"Want to touch it?" He leaned towards the nervous mage, pulling the neck of his tunic away to reveal the top of the angry red scar below.

"Don't be an ass," came Maka's muffled voice from under the table. The mage paled, looking terrified, but he retreated back to his bed. "Okay, I have all my spellbooks. Let's go."

The other mage gave her a once, a mixture of disdain and disbelief on his face. Still, he followed Maka out of the tent without another word.

And with that, he was alone.

Something under his skin itched, like a terrible demon's voice. There was a part of him that wanted to destroy the tent, tear it down, and leave the deer skull on the heap in defiance. He repressed the voice, and stretched out on his bed, determined to nap away some of the time he would have to spend without Maka.

But he could not sleep. The hole in the canvas at the top revealed the slowly moving gray clouds above, but they only served to increase his restlessness. After almost an hour of trying to nod off, he gave up and turned over. Gazing around the small tent, his eyes landed on the pile of Maka's spellbooks she had unearthed looking for her healing one; in her haste, she had not replaced them.

Sitting bolt upright, he felt an idea ignite in his mind. The book that Maka was given by the mad witch before her, Stein, the man who had invented the spell that had put him in his brother's body, that book- it lay in that pile. Burning curiosity overtook his senses, and he was barely cognizant of getting up and sitting himself at the stool in front of the rickety table. His long fingers, still so foreign, dragged down the covers of the tomes in front of him.

His father had been able to afford excellent tutors for his sons, so his letters were good, but he had not had occasion to read for many months. Some of the books were handwritten in old, curling scripts that had faded or been covered by splashes of spells long dormant, and he found them difficult to understand. A few of them were so old and worn that they almost fell apart in his hands, and he had to carefully turn each page as if handling silk. It was hard to tell which one was created by the man named Stein: would he have signed his name to a book that contained such forbidden magic? Instead, he had to carefully decipher the spells on every page before being able to rule them out.

One of the books had a dark stain on the cover that looked suspiciously like dried blood, and he felt a sinking feeling in his stomach that told him he was onto something. Opening it carefully, as if it might suddenly catch fire in his hands, he began to peruse its pages. The very first spell was one about turning the hand of one's enemy into a spider, so he decided he must have found the right one.

Each page revealed a curse more horrific than the last. They all described in detail what body parts were needed to perform the evil magic: sometimes from the victim, sometimes from the caster, and even sometimes from a cadaver. The pages smelled faintly of bile and pus, and between that and the images sketched by a careful hand onto the paper, it was all he could do to keep from gagging. The handwriting of the man who had penned the spells was most chilling of all, however. It was neat, orderly, clinical, as if the subject matter of the words it spelled out did not bother the author in the least.

His stomach turned over again when he flipped the page to reveal two side-by-side bodies with an arrow between them. In the middle of the arrow was a small, blue sphere: the soul, he assumed. Having no ability to see souls, he didn't know what they looked like, but the title of the page spoke of "The Transference of Souls," so he knew he was right.

The faces of the two men in the drawing were passive, unemotional. He tried to swallow around the lump rising in his throat. Their calm seemed entirely at odds with the storm roiling inside him every day, but he read on.

 _One Soul can be transferred to another body, should the body in question be adequately similar. A Soul influences the growth and development of the body during normal childhood, so a vessel crafted in an entirely different image will naturally reject the foreign Soul. Most effective are the transfers between identical twins, though further experimentation is required to determine the influence of divergent personalities on the newly accepted Soul in the host body. Natural siblings may also accept the Souls of their fallen family members, and it is theorized that even transference between parent and child can be done successfully (though the directionality of this exchange is tenuous and requires further study). Souls that are joined to a body that rejects the invading spirit energy cannot be retrieved, but instead the reaction of two incompatible systems causes the body and Soul to mutate beyond recognition of human form. These creatures are heretofore dubbed 'Kishin;' they appear to retain none of the memories of their previous lives, and seek only to devour pure Souls after their transformation. It is unknown how long it can take for a body to reject a Soul before transforming into a Kishin._

There was a ringing in his ears. The feeling of itchiness erupted across his skin again, and he dragged his nails across his arms, leaving red trails behind him. His skin felt hot to the touch, too hot, and his breathing became ragged and labored.

 _Was he going to turn into a true monster?_

"What's-?"

The tent was darker than when he had begun his reading; hours must have passed. He felt cold hands scrabble to grab his, but he pulled away, almost falling off the stool on which he perched.

"Stop!" she cried, elbowing her way into his space, too close, too close-

Maka wrapped her hands around his collar, dragging him upright. He growled and shot his own hands up to curl around hers, and with a clack, his stool righted itself and their faces remained only inches apart, both breathing heavily.

"What is going on?" she asked, eyes blazing but voice soft.

"Why didn't you tell me about this?"

She flicked her eyes to the side to see the book open across the table, the horrible truths it contained laid bare. Maka closed her eyes for a moment, as if steeling herself, but when she opened them and made eye contact with him again, they were hardened once more.

"Because it's not an issue."

"' _Not an issue'?!"_ His hand shot out and grabbed one of her twin tails hanging somewhat limply from her head. Gently, he pulled her face even closer. "I could turn on you in a moment's notice."

Her breath ghosted over his mouth as she replied. "But you won't."

"How do you know?" he growled.

"Because I held your soul in my hands," she said, even more softly than before. "It was warm, and gently, and caring, and kind. It was a little unsure and a little self-deprecating, but it was- it was beautiful. I know your soul. I know you are a good person. I wouldn't have thrown my whole life away for a soul that wasn't worth it."

Her words seeped into his skin like the salve she prepared for him for weeks, permeating the air and pressing into his core from the outside, gentle yet unrelenting. He glanced down to look at her lips, still a little chapped from her constant gnawing on them, plump and inviting. She seemed to lean into him slightly.

But he wore Wes's face, and his hair was bone white and his teeth were razor sharp, and he was a monster. He curled his lip up and ran his tongue along his gums, slowly and laboriously, eyes locking on hers again. Her eyebrows furrowed in the middle of her forehead.

"How beautiful can a soul be when it turns a handsome body into this?" he asked silkily.

Maka tightened her grip on his collar. "Why are you so worried about something so trivial as your hair?"

He clicked his teeth together with a snap. "Don't forget these," he said with a confidence he didn't feel.

"I didn't!" But at her words, a blush began to creep up her cheeks and across the tops of her ears. He chuckled. "You're so determined to hate yourself," she said. "Stop it."

Where was she years and years ago? But he didn't acknowledge that, only saying, "You're so determined to prove someone could love a monster."

Now it was her turn to stare at his lips. "Why are you so convinced that it's hard?" she asked, voice barely above a whisper, and then her lips were slanted against his, a little rough, a little dry, but warm, so warm. He could smell her hair as he tugged her ever so slightly forward to him; it was earthy, like the herbs she used in her spells. Her technique was much like her technique in all aspects: forceful and passionate, if a bit inexperienced.

With a finger, he pulled at the corner of his mouth again. She stopped, looking at him in confusion.

"Better watch out," he said, voice low and rough. Inwardly, he cursed himself; he sounded so _needy_ , and he was needy, he was desperate- but Maka only disentangled one of her hands from his collar and curled her fingers slightly over the edge of his bottom teeth. He could taste the salt on her skin.

"I'm not afraid of you."

He bit down slightly, and the tang of iron dripped onto his tongue. "You should be," and he recaptured her mouth, her hand moving from his mouth to twist in his hair. The taste of her blood ignited something in his belly, something primal and urgent, and her knee that fell onto the stool to press against his groin was a clear reminder that his response to this sort of thing had not changed between his body and his brother's.

His brother's. His brother's body. The one he was in. The one Maka was kissing. With a frustrated growl, he pulled back again, but Maka closed the gap again and he felt her tongue lave at his neck. A shudder ran down his spine and she curled her other hand over his collarbone, drawing him towards her. She was persistent, insatiable, but what if, what if, _what if-_

He pulled back again, placing both his hands firmly on her shoulders. She stared down at him, lips swollen and eyes uncertain.

"I don't want to kill you," he said lowly.

She closed her eyes.

"I need some air," he said, and stood up to brush past her and into the cool night.

* * *

He remained outside the tent for several hours, staring at the stars. They glittered overhead, having hung in the sky for longer than his father's father's father's father's father's mansion had stood on the hill overlooking the village, but they held no answers for him. He knew who did, though.

Maka bustled in the tent, preparing dinner and cleaning out the spell ingredients that were no longer useful. She approached the edge of the doorway a few times, peering out from under the skull adorning the entranceway, but never spoke; he only knew she went to bed when he heard the creak of her cot as she slipped under the thin blankets. He waited. Soon enough, he could hear her even breathing coming from inside the tent, and he strode back in quietly, gazing around. The fire had burned down the embers, and Maka slept with one hand outstretched into empty space hanging off the edge of her bed. He passed her quietly and flipped the pages of the book written by Stein; Maka hadn't moved it. At the back was a hastily scrawled note, still the same handwriting but clearly written in a far greater hurry than the rest of the book:

" _Maka-_

 _I find myself in the predictable yet rather unfortunate circumstance of being hunted for my life due to my research. Due to this, I can no longer properly train you as a mage. As you may have surmised by now, I will have to go into hiding. I apologize; I had meant to teach you to harness your power to see Souls, and it seems I will not be able to do that. I encourage you, however, to cherish that gift. You are a special person, Maka, and I know that you will do amazing things with your immense powers. Please take this book as a means to remember me by. I hope you can learn something from it. I hope you can learn more from it than I knew in creating it._

 _If you ever need to find me, please use this enclosed talisman. Do not fear- only a lock of your own hair can activate it. Only you shall be able to find me, if you need to do so. Take care, Maka._

 _With love from,_

 _Your Godfather Stein_

The short knife Maka used to slice herbs slid through her hair easily enough; he took only a small lock so as not to mar her beauty too much. She slept on, breathing softly through her now. Just as he turned from her to the entrance of the tent, her hand flexed; likely only an unconscious movement, but it still caused his heart to flutter. Her hand seemed to beckon to him, asking for his, fingers waiting to tangle with his. He swallowed, turned his back on her, then walked outside once more.


	5. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER 5**

The spell did only need Maka's hair to work; as soon as he braided the hair around the dried mugwort and thin piece of yellow string, it glowed a gentle golden light and shot out of his hand to take to the air. It folded itself into the form of a large firefly, hovering in front of his face silently. He lifted a foot as if to take a step, and the magicked firefly skittered off through the air. He paused, and the creature stopped too.

The sun slowly climbed through the sky, dyeing the sky from a dark blue to a pale lavender. The lightning bug Charm floated several feet ahead of him, its pace steady and its light fading slightly in the dawn. Once a group of soldiers passed several yards ahead of him on horseback, and the firefly shuddered and zoomed into his pocket even as he stepped behind a tree to conceal himself. It was only after they were gone for several minutes that the firefly reappeared, seeming to shake itself and ignite once more.

So he stuck to the woods, keeping away from farms and villages except at night to pilfer small amounts of food from various larders and kitchens. He always tried to take what they seemed to have the most of; he took no pleasure in forcing more hardship on people already just eking out a living. On warm nights, he slept in open fields, falling asleep to the sight of his enchanted firefly buzzing lazily overhead, and on the colder nights, he retreated into large barns, sneaking out before the morning light burned away the dew from the grasses.

He did not know how long he traveled. The sun rose and fell a dozen times, two dozen times, three dozen; he lost track. By avoiding the roads, he made slow progress, and he did his best never to run into another human being. Sometimes he would examine his hands, making sure they still were long thin fingers and not horrible claws, but he remained - for lack of a better work - mostly human. His shock of white hair was a clear giveaway, and he sometimes feared on moonlit nights that he would be discovered by someone he did not wish to meet, but he managed to keep away from people. His throat, always a source of slight discomfort, ached from disuse. He sometimes tried to speak out loud, but his voice was husky and hoarse, so he stopped trying.

He tried not to think about Maka. Tried not to think about what she was thinking about. Tried not to think about how he might have taken away her only chance to reunite with Stein, a man she seemed to care about from her childhood. He had left her only one spell, and when she awoke the morning after his disappearance, she would see his gift to her, page torn out and only connection severed.

Stein was clearly a talented mage; the firefly never dimmed, never got lost, never wavered. It even acted as a warning system for when people were nearby by retreating into his pocket. He wondered how the kind of man who tore open cadavers to examine their entrails could also create something so helpful, so childlike, so- _cute?_

The days grew longer and longer. This was helpful, because the woods around him grew wilder and wilder, and he needed as much light as possible to navigate them. Sometimes the trees grew so thick that the only light came from the firefly bobbing ahead of him.

Just as the sun was beginning to sink in the sky, the firefly began to whirl in a circle parallel to the ground, letting off a high-pitched whistle. He looked at it curiously for only a moment before it sped off between the trees, and he had to run to keep up. He was afraid he would lose it, it was moving so fast, but right before he could formulate a plan about how to keep up with it better, it stopped, flying in circles that were now vertical.

For a moment, he couldn't understand why they had stopped. But as his eyes adjusted, he realized the overgrown thing in front of him was a small cottage, and the dark brown thing that the firefly was indicating was actually a door. He raised his fist and knocked twice.

Silence. Then-

The door swung open to reveal a corpse.

* * *

A walking, talking corpse. The body was blue, and the skin was stretched in a maniacal grin across the face, but it spoke in a clear voice from between yellowing teeth: "Who are you?"

He felt his voice, so underused as it was, die in his throat. The lightning bug zoomed around the body and disappeared into the darkness of the cottage and the light faded. He was alone with a cadaver.

"Is it Maka? Sid, what's going-?" A man appeared behind the corpse, tall and pale but very much alive. He peered through cracked spectacles, squinting down at him. "You're not Maka."

"No," he said. He cleared his throat. "But I need-"

The man shot a hand out at him and he stumbled back. The man grabbed the collar of his shirt and yanked it down, revealing the top of his scar. The man glanced between the injury that was on his soul and the injury on his throat, the thing that killed his brother.

"Come inside," he said. "My name is Stein."

* * *

The firefly scuttled across the desk, happily investigating all the paraphernalia across it. It was no longer lit up, but it still seemed to have plenty of magic to function. Now that he could see it up close, it looked a little odd: he kept seeing flashes of that ashy blonde hair that he knew to Maka's.

The man named Stein sat in the chair and indicated another one. He joined the man, though he felt somewhat foolish. What was he going to say?

But Stein wasted no time. "So. You are a switched soul."

He stared.

"I can tell by your hair. That's a common side effect of the process. Most of the patients for whom I attempted a transplant had their hair go brilliantly white. I mean, before they turned into Kishins and began to attack people. Their hair changed dramatically with that transformation."

He felt nauseous. "Doesn't that _bother_ you?"

"Oh, tremendously," said Stein, completely without inflection. He calmly began to pack a pipe pulled from the depths of his desk, watching the young man in front of him carefully. "I was banished and went into hiding for a reason. I am immensely distraught over it."

He could do nothing but blink owlishly. Stein struck a flint, and a spark ignited whatever dried thing he had put into the pipe. It lit and an acrid scent filled the air. The firefly paused in its exploration to watch the flame dance briefly before shuffling under some loose papers and disappearing again.

"Why did you do it, then? Why try to move a soul from one body to another?"

The older man took a long drag before answering. "I have asked myself that question many, many times over the years I've been living out here. I can come up with a different answer for almost every day of the season, and keep you here all summer while you listen. But the one I will tell you today is because I strove to save people; I wanted to help. I was just… so lost in my own desire that I could not see the harm I did right in front of my nose."

"So it never worked? When you did it?"

"Not once. Or, not perfectly. Sid here is the only example of a partial success I had, and you can see how his body continued to decay. He's also always talking about 'the man he used to be,' which I don't know whether is a side effect of his condition or if he truly is trying to remind himself what he once was." Stein paused to take another hit on the pipe. "No, I could see where my efforts were effective - the souls adhered best to bodies that most resembled their originals - but I was unable to actually make anything work. It was very frustrating."

He narrowed his eyes. "Then how did Maka manage it?"

Stein smiled, the first one he'd seen on the man's face. "I long suspected Maka to be a more powerful mage than I. It seems I've been proven correct."

For a moment, he mulled on the older man's words. "Is that why you left her the book?"

"Yes. One of several reasons. Stop that." He looked up, but Stein was gazing sternly into his desk at the firefly. Apparently it had begun to chew on one of the papers. "Obnoxious thing. It has some of Maka's essence imbued into it, so it found a spell for reading faster and began to eat it. So like her." Stein turned to him. "Why did you leave her?"

Once again, he found himself speechless. "What?" he finally managed to croak out.

"She will have been made even more of a pariah than I am, I'm sure. People can dismiss the peculiarities of a man such as myself, but a beautiful young woman, of whom they expect a certain sensibility, they will surely attack even more harshly."

He bit his lip, a habit he had picked up from Maka. "I-"

"Perhaps you blamed her?"

"It was-"

"You were ungrateful that she had saved your life?"

"How did-"

"You thought, perhaps, that she deserved any fate she got for tampering with the laws of nature?"

" _No._ " He was standing now, hands shaking. "I care about her. More than- more than I should. I could have turned into a _Kishin_ and killed her at any moment. I had to leave."

Stein blinked at him from behind his broken glasses. "You are sure it had nothing to do with _your_ desire not to be hurt?"

The man could see souls. Of course. Of course he would see right through him.

"This body is my brother's!" he bellowed, slapping a hand to the borrowed chest. "Not only am I a freak, but I am the bastardization of my _brother_. Any part of me she cares about, any bit of me she wants- it's him, it's always been him, and I can't- she fell in love with _his face_ , or a horrific shadow of it, not at all with _me_."

"What does your brother look like?" Stein asked.

Dumbfounded, he dropped his hand.

"Well?"

"Like- like _this?_ Obviously?"

"Broad shoulders? Short, piggish nose?"

"Excuse me?"

"Sid!" called Stein into the other room of the cottage. "Could you bring the looking glass in here for a moment? I believe our friend needs to understand something."

Stein stood again and from his shorter - much shorter? - vantage point, he could see the corpse traipsing into the room holding a large mirror in front of him. The former man held it aloft so he could see as he approached, and it was a good thing the other creature was holding the mirror, because had it been him, he would have dropped it.

The face that gazed in horror back at him from the mirror was his own.

* * *

The next several days passed in a bit of a blur. He slept more than he had in the several weeks he spent on the road, and ate more meals than he'd previously been able to scrounge together. Sid was apparently a decent cook, an oddity for a man who could only eat rotten food, and he scarfed down his meals with vigor. Even the smell of Sid's decomposing food, which he insisted upon eating in the cottage as well, did not turn him off from the food.

It was taking him some adjusting to the idea that he was no longer- no longer- well, his brother. The person he had seen in the mirror wasn't precisely him, but it definitely wasn't Wes. He had sat down heavily, feeling lightheaded, as Stein leaned over him to say, "The soul shapes the body, my friend. You are, for all intents and purposes, yourself."

He finally had been able to find his voice. "How?"

"That is the thing, really. The soul influences the body around it, creating the physical form that most accurately reflects its true nature. If it attempts to mold a body that is too different than its nature, the two will interact poorly, and a Kishin will form. But if you put a soul in a body that is _almost_ right, _almost_ itself, it will be able to mold it into what it desires. There will be, for lack of a better word, an allergic reaction - the hair and the teeth, for example - but the body will eventually reflect the soul properly."

"Why didn't Maka tell me this was happening?"

"She likely didn't notice. The change is incredibly gradual, and seeing a person every day causes their image to blend together in their mind. She would have eventually, I'm sure, but it would have taken more time. If she were to see you now, however, I am quite sure she'd be impressed with the difference."

He had taken to touching his face all the time. The teeth still felt a little odd, but they fit strangely better now than his had ever had before his acquisition of this body. He could tell, now that he was paying attention, that the clothes he had been wearing were a little too long in the leg, a little too tight in the shoulders. His hands, his toes, his knees- they all looked as they always had. The change was subtle to the outside eye, but substantial to him.

The days were spent helping Sid in the kitchen and Stein in the lab. He pulled up weeds, harvested carrots and potatoes from the garden, separated herbs, braided knots, swept the floors, fed the cats. It was clear Maka had learned magic from the man; so many of the preparation he helped with back then was the same as the work he was doing now. He knew, at some point, Stein would yell at him again for abandoning Maka, but he pushed it aside. The guilt would overwhelm at night; he didn't need it invading the daylight hours as well.

He did want to return. He just… didn't know what to say. He knew he had hurt her, potentially severed the connection between them permanently, but he owed her an apology. As he took care of the mundane chores he worked on, he began to craft a speech for her, trying to sum up his feelings for her, all that she meant to him. It never came out quite right.

He never got to give it.

One morning, he was digging in the dirt for dandelion roots when Stein bellowed from inside the house. "Get in here!" he shouted. Sprinting in, there seemed to be nothing amiss, but Stein looked gray in the face and was shaking slightly.

"What is it?!"

Stein pointed an ominous finger to his desk. The firefly, which had taken up residency there and liked to rifle through his spells as he wrote them, lay on its back, feet curled inwards pointing skyward. It was clearly dead.

The older man whirled on him. "Maka is in danger. You must go to her."

"What?"

"Her essence here has faded. It means she may only have hours to live, if that. Her energies are pulling inwards, retreating- she is in terrible danger. Go. Find her. Protect her with your life."

Without hesitation, he nodded.

"I will prepare you some spells she can use to protect herself. Find Sid and get his steed; he'll know what I mean." And with that, Stein strode deeper into the larder.

Racing around back, he found Sid caring for the horses in the tiny hovel that passed for a barn there. "Sid, I need your steed," he panted, glancing between the animals, wondering which one it could be and how it could possibly be fast enough to get him to Maka in a few hours.

Sid stared at him, then nodded. He ducked into one of the stalls and brought out a flat piece of wood. He stared.

"Beelzebub," said Sid, and the board came to life, hovering in the air and glowing a strange black aura. Sid looked up. "It was a gift from Stein, many many years ago," he said by way of explanation. "It was his way of apologizing for grievous mistake he made in my transference."

He reached for the board, staring at the man before him.

"Step on it. You cannot fall; it's well enchanted. And you can fly as well as any bird." The man took a breath into lungs that no longer worked. "I have… always been grateful to Stein for what he did for me, even if I was very angry with him at first. I am sure you feel the same way about Maka."

He mounted the strange device and immediately felt more comfortable; the wood knew what it wanted to do, what it needed to do, and it was ready.

"Stein encouraged me to keep my original name, but it felt wrong to do so. I was no longer the person I had been before, and I could not. But I changed it only slightly; I suppose old habits die hard. One letter seemed enough a difference to me." He gazed up with pupiless bone white eyes, appearing both blind and all-seeing. "Good luck, my brother."

* * *

Beelzebub flew through the sky like a black lightning bolt. He was above the trees, above the thatched roofs below, everything a blur as he raced towards Maka. His heart was pounding with fear, but not at the height - though that normally would have terrified him. Right now, the only thing he feared was time.

Rivers snaked below him, glittering like diamond serpents. The countryside began to appear grayer and grayer, and he knew he drew closer to recent battlefields. The scent of corpses began to waft into his nose, and he knew he was close.

There. The encampment. The army he had fought for, the comrades he had protected. They were gathered around a platform, and even as his eyes watered in his descent, he could see Maka standing there, surrounded by heaps of wood-

One of the soldiers lit the rushes at her feet, and it burst into flames.

The fire approached her feet, but Maka did not scream, did not cry. She stared defiantly into the sky, watching the sun burst through the clouds. It meant that she saw him racing towards him, and a look of confusion spread across her face-

With a roar, he slammed into the platform, splintering Beelzebub against it. It burst into a purple flame that danced with the orange ones licking at Maka's ankles, and when it went out, it took some of them with it, though it wasn't enough to entirely stifle them.

Enraged, he gazed around the faces of the people he once considered allies. They looked horrified, a sea of disbelief and disgust, and he let out another roar.

" _You will not touch her!"_

He felt something shift within him, a cold energy unlike anything he had ever known coursed through his veins, and he let out a primal scream. The black blade that had destroyed his body suddenly burst from his side, fully sized and glistening with black blood, but it wasn't exactly the same, it was patterned serrated red-

He felt the transformation take over his entire body and with a final roar, he became his scythe. He felt his body fly through the air and into Maka's waiting grasp.


	6. Epilogue

**EPILOGUE**

He wrapped her in a blanket in front of their fire.

She smiled up at him, the bags under her eyes dark and her hair limp around her face. She looked the worse for wear, with scratches and burns all up and down her arms, but she was alive, and that was the most important thing to him. She had never looked more beautiful to him.

He would think later on the battle, a bloody terrible thing, in which some of the soldiers he had been brothers with had been slain, he would think about it later. For now, he and Maka had escaped, and they were alive, and there was a warm fire.

She had been a demon, an angel, with his scythe. He had never seen anything like it. She had made him a weapon of Death, and she the only one to wield him.

He would think on it later.

For now, he slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close to him. She leaned her head against his shoulder.

"I met someone like me," he said, the first words they'd spoken since the battle.

"Stein made one?" she asked quietly.

"More or less. But he inspired me to choose a new name for myself."

"Have you decided?"

"Yes. I want you to call me Soul." Maka turned her head slightly to look into his eyes. He gazed down at her, as in awe of her as she of him.

"Soul, then." She sat up a little straighter and touched his face. "You look different."

"I'm me again."

She shook her head. "No, you look happy."

He pressed his forehead to hers. "I am," he said, and kissed her again.


End file.
